This invention relates generally to xerographic copying apparatus, and more particularly, it relates to the heat and pressure fixing of particulate thermoplastic toner by direct contact with a heated fusing member having a release fluid applied thereto.
In the process of xerography, a light image of an original to be copied is typically recorded in the form of a latent electrostatic image upon a photosensitive member with subsequent rendering of the latent image visible by the application of electroscopic marking particles, commonly referred to as toner. The visual toner image can be either fixed directly upon the photosensitive member or transferred from the member to another support, such as a sheet of plain paper, with subsequent affixing of the image thereto.
In order to affix or fuse electroscopic toner material onto a support member by heat, it is necessary to elevate the temperature of the toner material to a point at which the constituents of the toner material coalesce and become tacky. This action causes the toner to flow to some extent into the fibers or pores of support members or otherwise upon the surfaces thereof. Thereafter, as the toner material cools, solidification of the toner material occurs causing the toner material to be bonded firmly to the support member. In both the xerographic as well as the electrographic recording arts, the use of thermal energy for fixing toner images onto a support member is old and well known.
One approach to thermal fusing of electroscopic toner images onto a support has been to pass the support with the toner images thereon between a pair of opposed roller members, at least one of which is internally heated. During operation of a fusing system of this type, the support member to which the toner images are electrostatically adhered is moved through the nip formed between the rolls with the toner image contacting the fuser roll thereby to effect heating of the toner images within the nip. By controlling the heat transferred to the toner, virtually no offset of the toner particles from the copy sheet to the fuser roll is experienced under normal conditions. This is because the heat applied to the surface of the roller is insufficient to raise the temperature of the surface of the roller above the "hot offset" temperature of the toner at which temperature the toner particles in the image areas of the toner liquify and cause a splitting action in the molten toner resulting in "hot offset". Splitting occurs when the cohesive forces holding the viscous toner mass together is less than the adhesive forces tending to offset it to a contacting surface such as a fuser roll.
Occasionally, however, toner particles will be offset to the fuser roll by an insufficient application of heat to the surface thereof (i.e. "cold" offsetting); by imperfections in the properties of the surface of the roll; or by the toner particles insufficiently adhering to the copy sheet by the electrostatic forces which normally hold them there. In such a case, toner particles may be transferred to the surface of the fuser roll with subsequent transfer to the backup roll during periods of time when no copy paper is in the nip.
Moreover, toner particles can be picked up by the fuser and/or backup roll during fusing of duplex copies or simply from the surroundings of the reproducing apparatus.
One arrangement for minimizing the foregoing problems, particularly that which is commonly referred to as "offsetting", has been to provide a fuser roll with an outer surface or covering of polytetrafluoroethylene, known by the trade name, Teflon to which a release agent such as silicone oil is applied, the thickness of the Teflon being on the order of several mils and the thickness of the oil being less than 1 micron. Silicone based oils, (polydimethylsiloxane), which possess a relatively low surface energy, have been found to be materials that are suitable for use in the heated fuser roll environment where Teflon constitutes the outer surface of the fuser roll. In practice, a thin layer of silicone oil is applied to the surface of the heated roll to form an interface between the roll surface and the toner images carried on the support material. Thus, a low surface energy layer is presented to the toner as it passes through the fuser nip and thereby prevents toner from offsetting to the fuser roll surface.
A fuser roll construction of the type described above is fabricated by applying in any suitable manner a solid layer of adhesive material to a rigid core or substrate, such as the solid Teflon outer surface or covering of the aforementioned arrangement.
In attempts to improve at least the perceived quality of the image fused or fixed by a heated roll fuser, such rolls have been provided with conformable surfaces comprising silicone rubber. As in the case of the Teflon coated fuser roll release fluids such as silicone based oils have been applied to the surface of the silicone rubber to both minimize offsetting and to facilitate stripping. See, for example, U.S. Pat. No. 3,964,431. When the fuser system is one which provides for applying silicone oil to silicone rubber, a low viscosity silicone oil (i.e. on the order of 100-1000 cs) has most commonly been employed.
Heretofore, the application of the silicone oil to the silicone rubber fuser roll has been accomplished uniformly by means of a wick or roller member which is coextensive with the longitudinal axis of the fuser roll to which it meters the silicone oil. Thus, it can be seen that a uniform amount of release fluid would be applied to the surface of the fuser roll by conventional metering systems. When the copy substrate dimension normal to the direction of travel of the substrate is less than the total length of the fuser roll the ends of the roll beyond the copy paper (i.e. the portion of the roll surface not contacted by the copy paper) continuously take on oil without removal thereof while the area contacted by the copy paper has some of the oil removed by the copy paper as it moves through the nip between the two roll structures. The foregoing results in the swelling of the ends of the roll to such a degree that paper handling problems occur resulting in wrinkled copies. In practice, it has been observed that the nip length (i.e. the length of the depression in the deformed roll) between the pressure roll and the ends of the fuser roll increase due to the swelling, approximately 5 mils where the original length had been 150 to 170 mils with 300 pounds total force being applied between the fuser and pressure rolls, the outside diameter of the roll being on the order of 2 to 3 inches with an outer layer of silicone rubber having a thickness on the order of 5 to 15 mils.